WINE & SPIRITS

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Some locals might turn up their nose at Caze's brash commercialism, but the city of Bordeaux, in all its 18th-century splendor, is on an identical wavelength. The city has become a staging ground for organized tours of the wine region that bears its name. It is also home to the école du Vin, where classes for travelers offer an orientation on the vineyards of the left and right banks of the Gironde River.

Though Bordeaux still doesn't have what Napa folks might call a "wine route," organized bus tours that hit three wine chateaux a day and new tasting destinations have sprung up all over the region. Near the city of Bordeaux, for example, wine négociant Millesima offers tours of their hangar-sized storage facility and tastings from among the 4,000 brands in their roster (shipped all over Europe). This enormous wine vault is stacked floor to ceiling with cases of wine, including a breathtaking array—in multiple vintages—of such legends as Cheval-Blanc, Haut Brion, Lafite and Latour.

Or head to La Winery in Margaux, a wine shop and entertainment complex where visitors undergo a taste test to determine their "wine sign" (sensualist, experimentalist, aesthetic, etc.) and then follow their symbols to purchase the wines according to their sign.

Meanwhile, the medieval village of St. Emilion, with its underground cathedral (and 98 wine shops), needs no gimmick to attract its share of visitors. You will find even more of a bear hug of a welcome in Sauternes, the most chateaux-laden and scenic center of Bordeaux's sweet wine crop. There you'll encounter elaborate Italian gardens (at the 17th-century Chateau de Malle) and, of course, the legendary property Chateau d'Yquem, open to the public on a very limited basis. You can even spend a night overlooking the beautiful, morning-misted vineyards by renting a suite at the lovely property of Chateau d'Arche.

No immersion visit to the land of Cabernet Sauvignon would be complete without actually immersing yourself in the grape, a feat accomplished at Les Sources de Caudalie, a hotel and wine spa in Graves where grape products are touted for their anti-aging properties (thanks to built-in polyphenols).